…is an annual tradition at the Flatiron Arts building, home of PI&S. Artists claim public wallspace and create a winding, collaborative ribbon-mural throughout the hallways of this great, old maze of a building. In 2012, I painted a piece dedicated to Trayvon Martin, who had been killed on Feb. 26th of that year, when George Zimmerman mistook Martin’s Skittles for a weapon. The piece featured real (discharged) multi-colored shotgun shells, and a chalkboard where all the children killed by handguns in the 41 days between First Friday and his death were tallied.

In 2013, I put up a mural celebrating the life of recently deceased artist Ralph McQuarrie and the 100th anniversary of the Flatiron, mashing the image of an imperial star-destroyer with that of the Flatiron receding in a car’s rear-view mirror (with “Studios for rent” spelled backwards.)

This year’s mural show is up through June 6th when the murals get white-washed for the First Friday monthly open studios.